


You give him a key

by misssunangel



Category: Druck | SKAM (Germany)
Genre: Angst and Fluff, Canon Trans Character, Coming Out, Implied/Referenced Drug Use, M/M, References to Depression, Self Loathing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-03
Updated: 2019-05-03
Packaged: 2020-02-16 12:39:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,407
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18691687
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/misssunangel/pseuds/misssunangel
Summary: This is my attempt at a “what happens after David comes out as trans to Matteo and leaves, scene.” It’s all from Matteo’s pov and follows his mental health and thought process throughout the season as he meets David in relation to the poem "The seven stages of falling in love".I promise tears but I also promise fluff you just have to read it and see for yourself.





	You give him a key

**Author's Note:**

> based on this poem https://poemsforpersephone.tumblr.com/post/139069401719/seven-steps-to-falling-in-love-ls-step-1-you  
> “The seven stages of falling in love”.  
> 

YOU GIVE HIM A KEY

_step 1. you don’t quite remember how it feels to feel but there’s an echo in your chest that you think might be curiosity. or maybe it’s just heartburn._

For Matteo waking up always feels like he is in limbo. Not quite alive, not quite dead. For years his life has just been one big blur. A blur of getting himself drunk, smoking weed, getting dragged along to parties where he is forced to watch Jonas hook up with girls, wishing it was him instead that was on Jonas’ lap, wishing he could feel what his fingers felt like if he locked them into his own. And this morning was no exception. Yesterday he had invited people to celebrate moving in with Hans and Mia and has always he had gotten absolutely shitfaced. He vaguely remembers being dragged onto the dancefloor by Sara and reluctantly kissing her. He also remembers sitting in the bathtub with Jonas and the other boys and being disgusted with what he saw in the mirror. Jonas. He was lying next to Matteo on the bed, his face utterly relaxed and Matteo wanted to stroke his hair so badly, to feel his curls and press them between his fingers. So he did, for a few seconds, his touch so faint that Jonas surely couldn’t have felt any of that right? Then his eyes wander to Jonas’ arm, where he sees a phone number scribbled in messy handwriting. This forces a small scoff out of him, before he turns around again and passively scrolls through his phone, in an attempt to make the thoughts about Jonas vanish.

_step 2. there’s something different about the way that he moves, like the earth is a chessboard and every step is a potential loss, another way to be taken from the game._

Matteo is walking down the hallway at school on his way to class, shoulders slightly hunched and barely alert towards his surroundings, when he sees him.  
He is walking straight past him and for a moment Matteo swears the boy holds his gaze. The boy in question is roughly his age, has wavy dark hair and is wearing a pair of headphones around his neck that match the rest of his black clothes. But what strikes Matteo is the boy’s face. He has a strong set of cheekbones that align perfectly with his soft and slightly flushed cheeks and his lips are a shade that is almost magenta and so beautiful that Matteo can’t stop staring at them. Even though they’ve already long since passed each other, Matteo just can’t help taking one last look at the boy and when he turns around he swears he can feel the boy’s eyes on him.

_step 3. you promise protection because it is all you can offer. what else could he want? your fingers were only made to hurt and tear and bruise. you hold violence the same way others hold hands._

The next time Matteo sees him he is caught completely off guard. It’s Friday evening and out of all the places he could be right now he is in school because Amira had made him go. It had all been fun and games to sit in the back and roll his eyes at Kiki’s over enthusiastic speeches about vegan macarons, until they had decided to do fucking trust exercises and Matteo was out of the door so quickly no one managed to notice. And there out of all places he saw the boy again. Mystery boy was just on his way through the door when Matteo gestures towards him “Uhm I wouldn’t go in there”.  
“Why not?”. Mystery boy asks. Shit he looks even better than the first time Matteo saw him, if that is at all possible. Matteo loses all train of thought before he responds “They’re doing some kind of trust circle in there…you know with hand holding and stuff unless you’re into stuff like that”. Wow, real smooth Matteo, he wishes the ground would swallow him whole.  
But to his surprise Mystery boy says “No.”  
“I thought so”, he replies, smiling a little.

It’s only when Matteo invites Mystery boy to smoke a joint with him, that Matteo finds out his name.

David. His name is David. Matteo repeats the name to himself over and over again in his head, like a prayer, like a promise and like something that maybe for the first time in Matteo’s life, sparks hope.

—————————————————————-

The first time they hang out, they are both high again and eating cheese toast, but Matteo is hearing David laugh for the first time in a way that exposes David’s dimples and it’s a sound that Matteo never wants to stop hearing. When he comes back from the bathroom though, after having invited David to his room to show him more of his games, David is gone and all that’s left of him is his beanie.

—————————————————————

And then there is the first time they almost kiss. Matteo swears he could feels his lips brush David’s for the fraction of a second and he actually feels alive for once, his heart pounding, pulse racing. Their noses are brushing and Matteo can feel how warm David is and he just wants to wraps his arms around him…when Alexander and Mia burst through the door arguing causing both Matteo and David to turn away from each other.

————————————————————–

  
_step 4. the first time you see him without medication twisting your brain you think ‘this could be a problem.’ you try to ignore that it already is, that is has been for a while now._

Next is oxygen, more oxygen than Matteo thought his lungs were capable of, breathless from running around the empty pool with David, trying to catch up with him but failing and both of them filling the room with laughter.  
“We’re actually underwater now, so that means that we actually can’t breathe” David smirks. The sentence makes Matteo feel so giddy it makes him nauseous. David is coming closer and Matteo swears he has never been this happy as David places a tender kiss on his lips.  
“I win”, David says as Matteo exhales.  
“Rematch”, Matteo says.  
“Okay”, David smiles. It’s so cute Matteo wants to kiss that smile right off his lips and that is exactly what he is about to do.  
When their lips finally crash against each other, it’s as soft as silk and David tastes the way stars feel when you look at them, but Matteo also feels like he is drowning. They are really underwater, the play pretend has become real and both of them don’t need the ability to breathe because they have each other and with each kiss they grow more hungry to find new ways to make each other shiver.

  
_step 5. he vanishes into the night and with him he takes your ability to breathe, leaving a gap in the universe, a vacuum sucking the air from your lungs and for the first time in forever you feel fear._

When Matteo receives the text after having tried to talk to david, it feels like he is drowning. Not like the way he felt when David’s lips brushed his for the first time and he felt like he was being pulled under only to be brought back to the surface to finally exhale again. In that moment he had felt more alive than ever, he had felt like perhaps he might be capable of loving someone after all. Now he felt like he couldn’t breathe, like the waves had taken him and he was trying to come back to the surface but he couldn’t because the current wouldn’t let go of him. The current was David, saying that he didn’t want anything to do with him. Matteo scoffed, god had he really thought that there was a chance that someone loved him back? Had he really thought that the monster inside him was capable of wanting someone, being with someone, without fucking it up? Now the waves turned into a storm and Matteo didn’t even feel anything when he threw his phone on the ground in anger and it shattered into pieces. He still didn’t feel when he picked it up, but he could feel his cheeks getting wet from tears. He let out another sarcastic laugh, great just brilliant the boy who didn’t feel was crying. The boy who didn’t feel had pushed Hans, one of his best friends away and now he didn’t even have David. David. Thinking about him, repeating his name to himself in his head feels like a knife is cutting through him. That name had once been his to say, that name had made him happy. But now David isn’t his anymore and the monster is alone once again.

_step 6. every bruise on his body is another reason to walk away but you passed the point where you could leave long ago. now your hands try to learn how to hold and to stroke, how to soothe burns and bruises. they re-learn how to be hands instead of just another weapon to wield against life._

It’s Friday and Matteo is ready to get wasted out of his mind. At least Carlos, Abdi and Jonas are here but them talking about which girl they want to fuck almost makes him wish they weren’t, but at least he’s not alone then. Everything is better than being alone.  
His phone buzzes and he receives a text. It’s from David, a little animated gif with a moving car and two people sitting in it, the sky a mixture of pink and light blue.  
Jonas asks him what the text is and says he should tell David to stop sending him drawings unless he wants to be with him and Matteo does just that. He can’t take it anymore, the little drawings giving him hope even though he knew they shouldn't’. David didn’t want to be with him, that was it end of story. David was just trying to make him feel better, Matteo convinces himself, right until the doorbell rings and Matteo sees David standing on his front step, that is.

When he sees David’s perfectly messy hair and his long eyelashes again for the first time in weeks, Matteo feels like he is going to combust. He opens the door and all he manages to let out is a soft “Hey.” That’s okay though, because their stares say much more than words can.  
David moves closer to him and there it is again, that pull where Matteo feels he is drowning. David leans in, his lips almost touching Matteo’s, but Matteo decides against it and pulls David into a tight embrace instead. Now they are really drowning. Drowning in each other’s arms, Matteo’s finger stroking David’s back and pulling him in, tighter and tighter, and David pressing a soft kiss against his shoulder. Drowning because they haven’t found the right words to say yet and Matteo is pretty certain that David is trembling, but he knows David and that fear he gets in his eyes when Matteo asks him how he feels. Drowning because they missed each other, weeks having passed where the only connection they had was David’s drawings, never hearing the other’s voice or feeling the other’s touch.  
After what feels like an eternity, David lifts his head and looks straight into Matteo’s eyes. His eyes are red as if he has been crying, but there are no tears to prove it.  
“Come,” Matteo says, offering his hand in the direction of the boy with the deep brown eyes, the ones that gleam in golden tones whenever they come in contact with light.  
David takes it, and Matteo slowly feels himself come back to the surface.

It’s morning and they have been lying in each other’s arms all night, Matteo using David’s shoulder as a pillow. But when he wakes up, David’s familiar soft delicate fingers are nowhere to be found and for a moment that fear, that crippling anxiety the monster inside him feels is back, but then he sees David standing by the window. He gets up, asking David why he is up so early and if everything’s okay. But David says it’s nothing and walks away from the window, towards the door “Matteo I think I should..”

“What? Leave again? Just fuck off again?”, the second he says those words he instantly regrets it, there is that monster again, Matteo can feel disgust creeping up inside him, disgust with himself. But this can’t be happening again, David can’t be leaving again, this can’t be it, he won’t let it.

“I have something on my phone that.. that I can read to you. Or I can send it to you–” David says but Matteo cuts him off. “Or you just tell me!” David has to talk to him, they can’t keep going like this playing in their pretend world, this is real…at least Matteo wants it to be.

“Yes, you’re right. Uhm.. Well, the.. most of the boys.. are just boys. And girls too. Uhm.. but sometimes that’s different”, David says, his fingers fidgeting and Matteo can hear David’s breathing getting stuck in his throat.

He can’t make sense of this any of this. David hasn’t shared his feelings in this way before…it’s so new and overwhelming that it makes Matteo dizzy but he wants David to keep going, he wants to understand.

“What?”

David takes a deep breath. “I was born in a girl’s body. But I’m a boy, I.. I’m transgender.”

That wasn’t what Matteo expected, he wants to know what that means…to understand but he doesn’t know what to say that can begin to make David feel like he is heard, to show him that he loves him. He wants to do this right, David finally opened himself up to him, he finally picked up the courage…and here Matteo is sitting saying nothing, like an idiot. He is so broken and the monster inside him is going to fuck this up he is sure of it.

“Uhm.. sorry I.. I don’t know what to say.”

David looks at him, a hint of a smile on his lips “And that’s totally okay.”

Matteo wants to give it a shot, he wants to show David that he’s listening he wants to let David speak for himself but he also wants to give him some kind of reaction.

“That.. that means you’re a..”

“No, no.. I am a boy.” David interrupts him before Matteo can go any further and he is grateful because he is worried about what he might have said if he had finished. “ I just have to work a little harder for it.”

That kinda makes sense, Matteo guesses. But all he can think about is what David must have been through and how David deserves someone who can love him with all his heart. Matteo isn’t sure that is him, he wants it to be…but he’s just this stupid little boy who pushes everyone away. “Why didn’t you tell me that sooner?”, he asks.

“I actually didn’t want to tell anyone at the school. And then.. I met you and.. I don’t know, missed the right moment somehow.” Matteo gasps at the raw emotion in David’s words, he really does like him back, there really is a possibility that they can be together. “But I really like you. And.. I don’t want this to…destroy everything.”

Matteo is just about to say something, when Hans bursts in through the door, wearing a pink wig, accompanied by some dude Matteo thinks is called Andi and giggling “Uh sorry for the disruption”. He wants to slam the door shut, Hans’ timing couldn’t possibly have been worse and the shock, at being interrupted in their conversation, is visible on David’s face.  
“I think I should probably go”, David says.  
Fuck. Fuck. FuckFuckFuckFuck. Matteo doesn’t want David to leave he wants David to know he isn’t alone he wants David to know that Matteo is in this and that he’s not going anywhere. But Matteo feels like he can’t move or can’t speak. It’s like he’s frozen on the spot. And who’s he to stop David from leaving, when Matteo isn’t exactly boyfriend material. David is strong and athletic. He’s an amazing artist and he has a laugh that makes Matteo feel like he’s floating. Meanwhile Matteo is just here, not even able to speak.

“Call me if you want”, David says.

Matteo nods and that’s it David is gone, as if he had never been there.

 _step 7. you told yourself that love was a lie because there was no other way to survive your demons. you put everything you had left behind a door made of sulphur and steel, but this boy, who saw more than the monster they created, who would fight the sun if you’d let him, opened your heart by knocking instead of forcing the lock._  
_(and so you give him a key)_

Matteo knows that David said he could call him. He knows that he is being completely irrational. He knows that he should have turned around at that last bus stop instead of running so fast his legs can carry him. He knows that by the time he has reached his destination he is most likely going to vomit because he isn’t anywhere near in shape to be running 2 kilometres on an empty stomach but he doesn’t care. All he cares about is David. David. David. David. God how could he be so stupid? How could he let him leave again and make him feel alone? It didn’t matter now, nothing mattered right now except that he needed to get to David as fast as possible. When he reaches the building he feels a tinge of pain from the memories of the last time he was here, but he brushes is off and races to the door, knocking against the door frantically.  
This time it isn’t Laura that opens the door, it’s David, his eyes brimming with tears.  
He looks at Matteo’s sweaty face, his eyes filled with worry. But before he can say anything, the words pour out of Matteo.  
“I’m sorry. I’m sorry I didn’t say more when you told me you were trans. I’m sorry I didn’t message you or call you. I was scared of screwing this up, like I always screw everything up. I didn’t want to lose you, by saying the wrong thing. The truth is I really like you too David.”  
David lets out a small sob and this time it’s him that drags Matteo into a tight hug.  
“It’s okay, you’re here now”, he whispers and they both disappear into David’s apartment, never letting go of each other, not even for a second.  
Matteo caresses his thumb across David’s cheek. “I just want you to know…I’m not good with words but..You are not alone you hear me? I’m right here and I’m not going anywhere ever again.”  
David, being too exhausted from the burst of emotions to say anything, takes Matteo’s hand and leads him to a messy, slightly broken sofa. They both sit down and Matteo gestures for David to put his head on Matteo’s lap. Matteo calmly caresses David’s hair, massaging different patterns into his scalp.  
And then they just talk. For hours and hours. David tells Matteo about his transition and how he still feels he has to try harder to be a boy than anyone else and Matteo listens and when he doesn’t understand he asks. When David finally tells Matteo about his binder, all Matteo feels is concern. “Does it hurt baby?”, he asks David softly.  
David grins widely, “Matteo, did you just call me baby for the first time?”  
Matteo laughs “What? No. There must be something wrong with your ears.”  
This causes David to push him playfully and Matteo grabs a nearby pillow and throws it against David’s face. Then all of a sudden they are kissing and all they can hear is each other’s breath, as the night slowly fades into darkness.

_This boy, who saw more than the monster they created, who would fight the sun if you’d let him, opened your heart by knocking instead of forcing the lock._

_And so you give him a key._


End file.
